


Growing Pains

by Marks



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Developing Relationship, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Black Eagles Route, M/M, Mutual Pining, Perfect Teatime!, Post-Timeskip | War Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Premarital Hand Kissing, self-deprecation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-01
Updated: 2019-11-01
Packaged: 2021-01-16 01:29:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21262871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marks/pseuds/Marks
Summary: "It is disgusting out there!" Ferdinand declares from the doorway, removing his coat and thoroughly shaking out like a dog. "Iam disgusting."Hubert raises an eyebrow. “You have never been disgusting a day in your life.""Wrong. I have had more disgusting days than I can count.” Ferdinand continues to wring out his hair. "There is a reason I did not accompany my father to Enbarr for two full years following my twelfth birthday."





	Growing Pains

**Author's Note:**

> sure am glad i'm painfully into the pairing that talks forever and thinks looking at each other for five seconds too long counts as a formal engagement.
> 
> just fyi: hubert very mildly puts down his physical looks here, but don't worry, ferdinand is there to loudly refute everything.

“It is disgusting out there!” Ferdinand declares from the doorway, removing his coat and thoroughly shaking out like a dog before joining Hubert in the tall garden where they often took tea. The weather is grey and wet, but the walls of Garreg Mach shield the garden from the worst of it. “_I_ am disgusting.”

Hubert raises an eyebrow. “You have never been disgusting a day in your life.”

“Wrong. I have had more disgusting days than I can count.” Ferdinand continues to wring out his hair as Hubert busies himself pouring their drinks. “There is a reason I did not accompany my father to Enbarr for two full years following my twelfth birthday.”

Now that Hubert thinks about it, those years had been rather quiet. He hands Ferdinand a cup and saucer, their gloved fingertips just brushing together as he does so.

“You should have seen me,” Ferdinand laments, leaning back in his chair. “Gangly. Spotty.” He pauses, searching. “_Hormonal_. I was quite grateful when I came out on the other side mostly unscathed.”

Ferdinand describing himself now as mostly unscathed is such an understatement that Hubert must let it pass, lest he dwell on it too long. Unfortunately, he spends far too much time these days trying not to dwell on Ferdinand.

“Puberty is a bitch to all of us,” Hubert says instead, and sips his coffee while Ferdinand splutters into his tea.

“_Is_ it?” Ferdinand says. “Because before my self-exile, I remember my voice cracking badly in front of a certain vassal to the Imperial Princess, one who unfortunately had a voice deeper than the sea.”

Hubert can’t help but smile at that. The gift of time has colored his memories of Ferdinand somewhat, his current sentimentality making him less annoying than the buzzy little fly he actually was. He isn’t even sure of the exact moment Ferdinand is referring to. However, he can picture it easily enough: teenaged Hubert, bored and drawling, trying to keep Ferdinand out of Lady Edelgard’s superior hair.

“I am a bit older,” Hubert reminds him. “When you were twelve, I had already been navigating that difficult path for two years.”

“That’s true enough,” Ferdinand says, “but try telling that to someone who couldn’t even introduce himself without squeaking on the Aegir.”

Hubert outright laughs then. “If it helps any, when I was thirteen, somehow I was uglier than I am now. Ghoulish and sweaty. I began changing my gloves thrice daily because my palms were constantly damp. The laundress must have been baffled.”

Ferdinand doesn’t laugh. In fact, Ferdinand falls silent for so long that Hubert grows worried and glances over at him. He seems fine, other than the deep grooves etched into his handsome brow.

“You are not ugly, Hubert,” Ferdinand says quietly.

“Ferdinand?”

Ferdinand turns his head, meeting Hubert’s eyes. “Do you think yourself ugly?”

In the face of Ferdinand’s earnestness, Hubert considers this seriously. “Perhaps ugly is overstating the case,” he concedes. He finds himself conceding to Ferdinand more and more lately and, to add insult to injury, he doesn’t even mind it. “But I am certainly no great beauty. Compared to you —”

Ferdinand’s eyes widen and Hubert snaps his mouth shut before he can fully cram his foot into it. Horrifyingly, he feels the blood rush to his face and he quickly looks at the floor before Ferdinand notices.

Silence surrounds them, deadlier than any poison; Hubert chokes on it.

But Ferdinand, as is his way, lances through the awkwardness and charges forward. “Compared to me?” Ferdinand repeats quietly. There is a tremor in his tone. “What is that supposed to mean?”

Hubert snorts down at his shoes. What is that supposed to mean, indeed. Shall he compare Ferdinand to a summer’s day? Does Ferdinand von Aegir seriously look upon himself in the mirror each morning and still think that’s a logical question to ask of another? Despite his better judgment, Hubert cannot help looking in Ferdinand’s direction again, finding him leaning forward, his tea forgotten. His cheeks are at least as red as Hubert’s must be.

“It means,” Hubert mutters, “that you have eyes.”

“I do have eyes,” Ferdinand agrees, pitched so far that it’s a wonder he’s not lying prone on the tabletop. “And yet, with those same eyes, I do not see you as ugly, so there is surely a miscommunication between us somewhere.”

“What a surprise,” Hubert says dryly. 

“It is a surprise!” Ferdinand agrees again, the volume of his voice climbing until it rivals Caspar’s. “Surely you’ve noticed that we’ve been in agreement more often than not as of late. You are an observant man, Hubert. Far more observant than me.”

Observant. It’s true; Hubert is observant. And he has observed Ferdinand’s copper hair in the sunlight, the tiny freckles that dot his nose and cheeks, and his beaming face as he canters on his favorite horse — not to mention his thighs as they squeeze around the saddle. 

“You are,” Hubert says haltingly, “attractive.” Handsome. Graceful. Devastatingly beautiful. The words inside his head are dangerous, made more so by the urgency with which Hubert wants to say them. 

“Attractive,” Ferdinand echoes disbelievingly, before sagging back into his chair. 

“Certainly you must be aware,” Hubert presses. 

Ferdinand laughs a little. “I think it is, as you say, overstating the case.” Then, infuriatingly, he tosses his hair over his shoulder. 

“Ferdinand,” Hubert says, exasperated, “you look like a child’s drawing of a storybook prince, riding a steed with hair flowing behind you and all.” 

“Oh,” says Ferdinand in a very small voice. 

At that, the silence hangs heavy over them again, another cloud cover to go along with the one in the sky. Hubert wonders if he overstepped. It’s ridiculous; Hubert has never worried much about decorum, between being well-taught and caring for little other than Edelgard, but with Ferdinand, he finds himself fretting, out of his element. Nowadays, he frets _so much_. 

Eventually, Ferdinand exhales loudly and it’s such a welcome sound that Hubert seizes it, looking Ferdinand’s way again. And Ferdinand looks back, his eyes wide, the bow of his mouth pursed. Hubert’s heart slams against his rib cage, relentless and inconvenient, just like Ferdinand himself.

“May I tell you a story?” Ferdinand asks. 

Hubert grabs onto this change of subject like a lifeline and nods. “Please.”

“I am sure it comes as no surprise that I was well-read as a child,” Ferdinand begins, a humble brag that makes Hubert roll his eyes. “Whenever I was not out riding or weapons training or learning the entire political history of Fódlan, I lost myself in stories.”

Hubert can picture this as easily as he can picture loud little Ferdinand annoying Edelgard, an interested wide-eyed child with a large book spread across his lap. 

“Do you know which parts interested me most?” asks Ferdinand. He examines his own hands, folded on the table.

“The swashbuckling?” Hubert suggests. He rubs his chin thoughtfully. “Or maybe when the damsel in distress was inevitably rescued?”

“That is what I thought you would say,” Ferdinand says, and nods. “Certainly it is the image I try to project.” He raises his head again, chin tipped up defiantly. “But perhaps I don’t project it quite as much as I once did?” He asks this in an unsure tone, and something inside Hubert twists.

“You don’t,” Hubert agrees readily. “It is a welcome change.”

The ghost of a smile appears and disappears upon Ferdinand’s lips. “Hubert, the truth is that is not the case,” he says. “Yes, of course, I enjoyed stories of adventure and rescue, but it wasn’t because of the dashing hero who, as you say, rode up on a steed with hair flowing behind him.” He shoots Hubert a larger grin then. “I was drawn to the villains — the darker, the more mysterious, the more mustache-twirling, the better.”

Ferdinand’s voice goes hazy as he delivers this news, a faraway thing that makes Hubert’s toes curl inside his boots.

“I remember asking my father once if it was all right to hope those evil men would one day turn toward the light, and he looked at me like I had lost my mind.” Ferdinand laughs ruefully. “Very low down on the list of my father’s slights, but still, it sticks with me.”

“He was horrible,” Hubert declares easily. “You are nothing like him.”

Ferdinand nods. “I know,” he says. “But back then, I desperately wished to be. And when I looked at myself in the mirror, I knew that dark and complicated was not in my future, no matter how much I wanted it. So, I pushed that down and ran far in the opposite direction.”

Even though this is just a story from Ferdinand’s childhood, Hubert considers it seriously. “I always liked the heroes,” he says eventually. “Of course nothing is accomplished if there is no one to embrace the shadows, but there is nothing wrong with striving for good, publicly and often. Sometimes I even think the two need each other.”

“I have come to better appreciate that viewpoint.” Ferdinand smiles down at his hands. “Especially as of late.”

Hubert’s heart thumps traitorously at those words, and speeds further when Ferdinand rises from his seat. “Ferdinand?” he asks, clearing his throat when the name gets caught there.

Slowly, inexorably, Ferdinand rounds the table and stops right in front of Hubert. He is not a small man, but Hubert is taller, so usually he does not give such things any thought. But with Hubert still seated, Ferdinand looms large, a bright spot intruding on the gloomy day. 

Then, Ferdinand reaches down and takes Hubert’s hand in his, leaning down to press his lips to Hubert’s gloved knuckles. Hubert cannot speak — cannot think, cannot even _breathe_ — as he feels Ferdinand’s natural warmth seep through the material to his skin. All the while, Ferdinand keeps Hubert’s gaze and the look in his eyes is so heated that Hubert worries he might melt into a puddle in his chair.

“Hubert,” Ferdinand murmurs, lifting his chin, “the point is you are not ugly. Not even a little. Not to me.”

Hubert swallows hard as Ferdinand lets go of his hand and straightens up, smoothing down the front of his shirt. He seems a bit nervous now, and that fact alone forces Hubert’s lungs into functioning again.

“I see.” Hubert’s hand still tingles in all the places Ferdinand touched. It is ridiculous how they are acting, but that doesn’t mean he wishes for it to stop. He aches, in fact, for how much he wishes for it to continue. Hubert lifts his arm and circles his own wrist with his other hand, flexing his fingers and watching as Ferdinand watches that. “Then I suppose the feeling is mutual. Ferdinand,” he says, “I am glad that when you look in the mirror you do not see a dark, mysterious villain looking back. It may be selfish, but I prefer the change of scenery you offer me.”

Ferdinand bites his lip, choking back a laugh. “That makes me happy, as well.”

Hubert tilts his head. “Sit again. Your tea has gone cold, but hopefully my company has not.”

“Can I see more of you later?” Ferdinand blurts and doesn’t sit. “I know we are both busy with our work and we’ll need to return to it soon, but this time between us is always too short.” He pauses. “Perhaps dinner tonight? Drinks?”

“What?” says Hubert. “You mean like a date?”

Ferdinand’s face goes bright red. But he straightens his spine and nods. “Yes,” he says, and his voice cracks in front of Hubert, like it must have all those years ago. He clears his throat. “Exactly like that.”

“All right,” Hubert says, letting his voice go deep as it can, smoother than the Dagdan coffee he just wasted. Hubert stands, bringing them toe-to-toe, and leans down, pressing his lips to Ferdinand’s temple, right at the edge of his storybook hair. He doesn’t miss the way Ferdinand briefly closes his eyes, nor the shiver that runs through his body. “Tonight,” he adds. “I will find you.”

“I look forward to it,” Ferdinand says, looking up. 

Despite their conversation, neither of them moves. The rain pitter-pats against the monastery walls, but here in the walled garden, nothing touches them.

**Author's Note:**

> talk to me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/nonnonnegative) so you don't miss out on gems like me calling this fic 'ferdiblirting.'


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